We use a human-subjects experiment to test the effects of a simple mechanism designed to increase cooperation and efficiency in the trust game. In the equilibrium of the standard trust game, the investor does not invest, foreseeing that the allocator would have kept all of the returns from investment. Our mechanism adds a preplay escrow stage, in which the allocator places an amount (possibly zero) into escrow, to be forfeited if he keeps the proceeds of investment for himself. In the experiment, we vary the amounts that can be put into escrow. Our baseline treatment has no escrow. In a second treatment, only low escrow choices are possible, so the equilibrium is unaffected. In our third treatment, there is an escrow amount high enough that, in equilibrium, investment and sharing of the proceeds will occur. Two additional treatments mirror our second and third, except that in these, the escrow amount is randomly chosen and imposed on the allocator. We find that the high escrow amount, when chosen, does lead to the predicted efficient result. Contrary to the equilibrium prediction, we also find substantial investment in both the baseline and “low-escrow” treatments, leading to markedly higher efficiency than predicted (albeit well below that when the high amount is chosen). Over time, however, cooperation and efficiency after low or zero escrow amounts decline. We find only weak evidence for “crowding-out”, which predicts that given a low or zero amount placed into escrow in non-baseline treatments, investment and efficiency would actually be lower than in the baseline. We also find that initially, investment is more likely after allocators place the maximum possible amount into escrow – as if this action by allocators is being (mistakenly) read by investors as a signal that allocators plan to share. All of these results are seen when escrow choices are imposed as well as when they are voluntary.

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.

References listed on IDEAS Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bri:cmpowp:06/154. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ()

If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link to it, you can help with this form.

If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through
the various RePEc services.